Next time you encounter a line at the Apple Store that’s just entirely too long, take it outside and let New York City’s boys in blue tackle your technological troubles.

The New York Police Department isn’t exactly dishing out free
trouble-shooting advice when it comes to malfunctioning MacBooks
and iPads, but they are encouraging Apple customers to update the
operating system that powers their iPhones to the latest version.

NYC residents have spotted NYPD officers out in droves near Apple
stores in recent days, handing out literature that lectures about
the new iOS7 operating system and its security features.

“By downloading the new operating system, should your device
be lost or stolen it cannot be reprogrammed without an Apple ID
and password,” the flyer reads.

The pamphlet also urges iPhone owners to register their devices
with the NYPD’s Operation Identification Program and provides
contact information for one cop specifically working towards
combating mobile phone theft.

And while the NYPD aren’t wrong to encourage New Yorkers to
update their devices to include the latest crime fighting tool,
the free advertising for Apple’s operating system is raising
eyebrows of residents weary of a growing partnership between law
enforcement and private enterprise.

Apple and the NYPD are touting the new iOS because the latest
version of the operating system makes it so anyone who’s acquired
a lost or stolen device can’t reprogram it unless they posses the
unique ID and password registered to its rightful owner.

According to Apple, the Activation Lock feature can “help you
keep your device secure, even if it is in the wrong hands, and
can improve your chances of recovering it. Even if you erase your
device remotely, Activation Lock can continue to deter anyone
from reactivating your device without your permission.”

It’s no surprise that the NYPD would want to take steps towards
securing phones. iPhone theft is so serious in New York that the
NYPD told WABC earlier this year that Apple product crime was up
40 percent compared with the previous year. Apple theft — or
“apple picking” as it's quickly becoming known — accounted
for 14.4 percent of major crimes in New York, AppleInsider
reported, and over 11,000 incidents were recorded by the NYPD
during just the first three quarters of last year.

“The theft of Apple phones and other hand-held devices drove
the spike in robberies and larceny,” Police Commissioner
Raymond Kelly told the ABC affiliate in February. “Operation
ID will help those whose property is lost or stolen to get it
back.”

During a bust this past May, the NYPD located more than 400
stolen iPhones inside a single home.

At the same time, the hand-in-hand cooperation between law
enforcement and the company that’s essentially collecting the
most private of personal information from millions of Americans
is making others unsure if upgrading operating systems is the way
to go.

United States Senator Al Franken (D-Minnesota) wrote Apple this
week to voice his concerns about the TouchID system, a new
security feature on the iPhone 5S that uses biometric fingerprint
data to supposedly keep devices secure.

“If someone hacks your password, you can change
it — as many times as you want. You can't change your
fingerprints. You have only ten of them. And you leave them on
everything you touch; they are definitely not a secret,” he
said.

“What's more, a password doesn't uniquely identify its owner —
a fingerprint does. Let me put it this way: if hackers get a hold
of your thumbprint, they could use it to identify and impersonate
you for the rest of your life,” added Franken.